Class- t~6^^ Book. '// /<^ (kpightl^' COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. ( \U y d HISTORY AND CIVICS OF OKLAHOMA BY L: J: ABBOTT, LL.B, M.A. PROFESSOR OF AMERICAN HISTORY, CENTRAL STATE NORMAL SCHOOL EDMOND, OKLAHOMA GINN AND COMPANY BOSTON • NEW YORK • CHICAGO • LONDON Copyright, 1910 By L. J. ABBOTT ALL RIGHTS RESERVED GINN AND COMPANY • PRO- PRIETORS • BOSTON • U.S.A. eCU265302 5\ t HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA PREFACE While Oklahoma is the youngest of the states, yet it had a considerable population almost a generation earlier than any of the states west of those that border the Mississippi, Texas alone excepted. Here we find much the best example of a prolonged effort of the aborigines of the United States to de- velop their own civilization in their own way. The history of this effort should be of interest to every student of American institutions. How much of this civilization was due to white influence and how much can be credited to Indian initiative must be left to the judgment of the reader. One of the chief benefits of historical study is the testing of authorities. No field offers a better opportunity for this than Oklahoma history. Almost all data relating to the Indian na- tions is so interwoven with myth and fiction that it is difficult, indeed, to separate authoritative facts from endless legends and weird tales of Indian life. So while this little book is pre- sented in concise, and we trust simple, form, yet we have zealously sought to use in its preparation no source that will not bear most careful scrutiny. We have not hesitated, where possible, to incorporate the exact text of the source in order that the student will thus be brought in closer touch with the men and events that we seek to picture. L. J. ABBOTT Edmond, Oklahoma CONTENTS Chapter Page I. Discovery of Oklahoma . i II. The French in Oklahoma 8 III. Exploration of the Arkansas 13 IV. Central and Southern Oklahoma Explored . 22 V. Why Indians were First moved to Oklahoma . 29 VI. Creeks and Cherokees compelled to leave Georgia 38 VII. Alabama, Mississippi, and Florida follow Georgia's Example 52 VIII. Indian Governments 60 IX. Progress of the Civilized Tribes 73 X. Early Military History of Oklahoma .... 88 XI. First Year of the Civil War 94 XII. The Battle of Pea Ridge and its Results . .105 XIII. From 1863 to the Close of the War . .116 XIV. Reconstruction and Reorganization 126 XV. Resistance of Plains Indians 140 XVI. Oklahoma Openings 160 XVII. Territorial Government .178 XVIII. Statehood 196 APPENDIX A. First State Officers 207 APPENDIX B. Territorial Governors, Delegates IN Con- gress, Cherokee Governors (Principal Chiefs) 208 APPENDIX C. General Census Returns 209 INDEX 211 vii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Page Grass Tepee of the Wichita Indians 4 CoRONADo's Signature 6 Cherokee Capitol, Tahlequah 62 Creek Capitol, Okmulgee 64 Chickasaw Capitol, Tishomingo .70 Bloomfield Academy 78 Sequoyah (George Guess) 80 Geronimo 151 Reverend Allen Wright 161 Territorial Governors 183 Honorable Dennis T. Flynn .189 City Hall, Guthrie 198 Honorable William H. Murray 199 Governor Charles N. Haskell 200 Temporary State House, Guthrie 202 Senators Owen and Gore 203 LIST OF MAPS Oklahoma in i 910 viii Coronado's Route, i 540-1541 3 Eastern Reservations of the Five Civilized Tribes . 31 Oklahoma when a Portion of Arkansas Territory . 35 Indian Territory Previous to Civil War ...... 74 Indian Territory in 1880 137 Oklahoma at the Time the Territory was Organized . 179 Oklahoma in 1893 184 HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA CHAPTER I DISCOVERY OF OKLAHOMA 1. Francisco Vasquez de Coronado. In the early summer of the year 1541 Francisco Vasquez de Coronado crossed the entire length of what is now the state of Oklahoma. Thus it will be seen that Oklahoma was explored less than a half century after the landing of Columbus, and seventy- nine years before the Pilgrim F'athers saw Plymouth Rock. 2. The ** Seven Cities of Cibola/* Early in the year 1540 Coronado assembled an army at Culiacan on the Gulf of California (see map, p. 3), consisting of three hundred Spaniards and eight hundred Mexican Indians. He was bent on the conquest of the famous "seven cities of Cibola," rumors of which were frequent in New Spain. A priest named Marcos de Nizza accompanied him as guide. This priest had previously been sent to verify the story of Cabeza de Vaca.i He claimed to have seen these famous cities, and 1 De Vaca had gone to Florida with Narvaez in 152S. He and three companions were the only ones who escaped the perils that overtook that expedition. After wandering nine years on the plains of Texas, they finally made their way to the Spanish settlements in Mexico. De Vaca reported having seen great cities toward the north (see Fourteenth Ethnology Report, Washington, 1893). Translations are here given of most of the sources that have to do with Coronado's expedition. For five cents any one can obtain from the directors of the Old South Work, Boston, a portion of De Vaca's Relacion, Leaflet No. 39. Leaflet No. 20 is one of Coronado's letters to Mendoza, the governor of Mexico. Coronado's letter to Charles V can be had for ten cents from Parker P. Simmons, New York. It is American History Leaflet No. 13. 2 HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA it was expected that he could lead the way directly to them. Marcos did not remain with the expedition long, however, for as they proceeded and it became evident that the facts were contrary to his report, the soldiers threatened to kill him. '' Coronado tells us in his letter to Mendoza that it grieved the whole company that a thing so highly commended, and whereof the Father (Marcos) had made so great brags, should be found so contrary, and it made them suspect that all the rest would fall out in like sort." ^ This is what did eventually happen. The famous cities of Cibola proved to be miserable New Mexican pueblos, probably the Zuni villages of to-day. But Coronado did not immediately relax his efforts to find other cities. He sent out expeditions in all directions. The Grand Canyon of the Colorado was visited ; a naval expedi- tion that accompanied him discovered the mouth of the Colorado River ; and one of his captains went east to the Rio Grande. 3. Discovery of Oklahoma. The report from the River Tiguex (Rio Grande) seemed so encouraging that Coronado moved his entire army to the little villages scattered along this stream. Irrigation was here practiced to a considerable extent, and the Indians of this region were more nearly civilized than any previously met north of Mexico. There were also villages east of the Rio Grande, on the Pacos River, which were likewise subdued. The Indians resented the long stay and the rough treatment of the Spaniards, with the re- sult that there was some hard fighting in which both natives and Spaniards received injuries. Finally, in April, 1541, Coronado was induced to proceed still further eastward in 1 Coronado's letter to Mendoza, Old South Leaflet No. 20, p. 2. This letter is a copy of the original translation by Richard Hakluyt. DISCOVERY OF OKLAHOMA the hope of finding the rich cities his imagination had so long pictured. "' So he started with the whole army and proceeded " a hundred and fifty leagues ^ toward the southeast from the village of Cicuique on the Pacos River. This must cer- tainly have taken the Spaniards into northern Texas, probably Coronado 1541 Coronado* s Ca Pike 1806 ... Wilk Long 1320.. Uarcy 1852. Coronado's Route, 1 540-1 541, and Routes of Others who explored Oklahoma somewhere in the vicinity of the present city of Fort Worth, because a journey four hundred and fifty miles (one hundred and fifty leagues) from the settlement on the Pacos to the southeast could not but lead one into this vicinity. Moreover, Coronado at this time must have been somewhere in Texas, because the army visited a village where Cabeza de Vaca and Dorantes had stopped when they were wandering in this 1 American History Leaflet No. 13, p. 8. 4 HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA ^ region ; and from De Vaca's account we are reasonably certain that the point where the hnes of travel of these two explorers crossed was in north-central Texas. 4. Quivira. On account of lack of food and the exhausted condition of both men and horses, Coronado ordered their return to the Rio Grande ; but he himself, with thirty of the best equipped men, struck out due north ^ in search of a Grass Tepee of the Wichita Indians (Caddo County), similar to those described by Coronado in his Letter to the Emperor Charles V province called Quivira, of which he had been told by the Indians. '' And with only the thirty horsemen whom I took for my escort," Coronado wrote in a letter to the emperor 1 Winship, George Park, The Journey of Coronado (New York, 1904), p. 68. Here is given Castarieda's report. He was historian of the expedi- tion, and his account is much the most elaborate that we have. 2 " By the needle " is how it is expressed in the original, American His- tory Leaflet No. 13, p. 8. DISCOVERY OF OKLAHOMA 5 Charles V/ "I traveled for forty-two days after I left the force, living all this while solely on the flesh of the bulls and cows which we killed." Coronado complained that in Quivira, which evidently was somewhere in central Kansas, the houses were not of stone, as the guide had led him to believe, but of straw.